Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Hot Chip @ Music Hall of Williamsburg / Terminal 5 - Tue Apr 08 / Sat Apr 12, 2008

A week with Hot Chip

There aren't that many bands I see live every time they come to NYC, me being busy or not. Hot Chip is one of those few bands, and with the way they are killing it these days, it seems they are gonna become much more than that... they might be my more consistently good live band ever.


I gotta say right away, that overall, the show at Terminal 5 was better than the one at Music Hall of Williamsburg. The latter was announced after the former one was sold out, and as you can imagine it sold out in minutes. After getting my T5 ticket, I bought my MHoW ticket too. MHoW was going to let me see Hot Chip up-close one more time before it is too late, even though the audience was going to be comprised of NYC area people who follow current music, bloggers or not, who are in general, pretty tough to be convinced by a band to shake it off. At T5, I imagined, I was going to be completely surrounded by truly Hot Chip fans, who were going to bring it down with the band no matter what. Of course I had to be at both shows.

In any case, Hot Chip killed it at both shows with, unfortunately, the exact same set list. Eleven songs before the encore, and four to close their spectacle, kept everybody ondulating their bodies, if not going crazy for the most danceable tracks.


Hot Chip's live shows keep having the same structure as always, but just different sets of songs. This time, the party and the dancing found their peak with Shake a Fist, Hold On, Bendable Poseable, Touch Too Much, Out at the Pictures, One Pure Thought, Ready for the Floor, Don't Dance, and a trio of old songs for which it is nearly impossible to stand still, Boy From School, Over & Over, and No Fit State. The humor, although a bit rare in their recent shows, it was present too with the fantastic Wrestlers, a song that live sounds huge with Alexis and Joe sort of rapping at each other back and forth. And last, love, lots of love... this time with the classic Crapt Kraft Dinner (I wish there were more time for some tracks like that off Coming On Strong and The Warning) and the new beautiful ballads Made in the Dark, that titles their newest and fabulous new album, and In the Privacy of Our Love.

Props to the new lights the band is using, to the new moves Owen and Alexis are making, to how confident Al is at the vocals now and at the guitar after touring with LCD Soundsystem dangerously way too much, to the new set up on stage with Felix playing the "drums" (drum machines actually) in the back, and to Joe's hilarious sort of rapping.


Damn, I think I am never going to get over this band. They make interesting music that I enjoy listening and singing along to in my house, in my car, in my parties, in the bars I go to, and live. Seriously, what else could I ask for? [photos of ths show at MHoW][photos of the show at T5][photos of the DJ Set at R Bar]

♫♫♫♫♫

Were you at the show? How did you like it?


Hot Chip Links: Stream Made in the Dark, Stream DJ-Kicks, Stream The Warning, Stream Coming on Strong, Official Website, YouTube, MySpace, Wikipedia

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